He should have thought twice...or perhaps even 3 times

Despite the fact that I give everyone the benefit of the doubt and assume they are intelligent human beings who will work in their own best interest, I am often presented with stories like this one. People seem determined to crush their own careers (and their lives, in this case) by doing something impulsive and frankly, stupid.

In today's world, you have to be very careful to not "act out" when bad things happen to you. Take a 10 mile hike, got to the gym and work on the heavy bag for 3 hours, heck, even go get drunk in the privacy and safety of your own home, but NEVER mess with your former company, EVER!

You might think of it has a harmless prank, but. more and more, companies are taking stupid actions like this and prosecuting them to the full extents of the law. Misdemeanors quickly turn into felonies under today's laws and you could find yourself doing hard time for a single, impulsive action. It seems obvious that no sense of satisfaction is worth that.

Of course, it shouldn't take news stories such as this, or the laws they discuss, to convince you that attacking the systems of a former employer are a bad idea. I would expect that every one of you already knows this. That said, be aware the there are those around you who don't seem to understand. You may run into them on occasion, but NEVER, EVER follow their lead. You just might find yourself out of career completely, if not something even worse.

Get Fired. Delete Colleague's Account. Go To Jail. SierraPete writes "CNet reports that Thomas Millot, a former systems analyst for a major pharmaceutical company, has lost his appeal on a computer intrusion charge. Mr. Millot was convicted of unlawfully entering the system that he used to work on and deleting a colleague's account after his job was outsourced. Mr. Millot's attorneys argued that his actions did amount to $5K in damage--the threshold for the crime he was convicted of. The court disagreed, saying that IBM had done over $20K in work to undo his handiwork."

(Via Slashdot.)

See also: Previous Posts on Ethics

See also: Books on Computer Ethics


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